Lost in translation

… or not. Israeli spokesmen and women use the 1 million Israelis who have to take shelter from Gaza rockets as a reason to wreak devastation on the 1.8 million people of Gaza, the most densely populated area on Earth. So we have nearly three million people fearing for their safety nearly two thirds of them already living in poverty and many of them nursing the wounds of previous Israeli action.

To describe what is happening as ‘assymetric’ is to make understatement hyperbolic. We should not minimize the fear felt by Israelis in Southern Israel, nor should we inflate their value above that of Palestinians who have lived as refugees and displaced people, with restrictions of fuel, energy and water, for 40 years and more.

Is the present action a pre-election gambit by Netahyahu, or does it hide something more sinister; an attack on Iran maybe. Over the two weeks previous to the assassination of Ahmed Jabari 19 people, including children, were killed in Gaza by Israeli bombing and missile attacks. Arguing about who started what is futile; yesterday, two weeks ago, 1967, 1948, 1917: all viable dates along with many others. If you want to do something for peace join with Jewish Voice for Peace and sign their letter, HERE

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2 Comments

Paulm
on 16th November 2012 at 21:08

The Israelis wrongly build settlements in the West Bank. However, in Gaza they are blameless. What happened about 10 years ago was that an unusually moderate Israeli government removed all soldiers and settlers from Gaza and left the Gazans to run their own affairs without intervention. What happened is that a very militant government was voted in by the Gazans and they started attacking Israel for no reason other than the fact that they hated all Jews. Israel does not attack Jordan or Egypt and would ignore Gaza also if they did not have a terrorist government. There are Israeli soldiers in a narrow border region of Gaza to search people going in and out of Gaza but other than that that the intention was to have no Israeli troops in Gaza.

Sadly, Paul, You are wrong on practically every count. (For an excellent analysis see ‘Israel and Palestine, competing histories’ by Mike Berry and Greg Philo).
Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005 principally because of the demographic threat. Add 1.5 million Gazans to the Palestinian Arabic population of Israel plus those in the West Bank & Israel can no longer hide behind the facade of ‘democratic’. As to democracy in Israel check out my post ‘a Good Read’ of September.
The truth is that Gaza has never been left to run its own affairs. There have been restrictions on diesel, on electricity, on water, foodstuffs and building materials before Hamas ever fired a rocket.
The reason Hamas attacked Israel was because the Palestinians had lost their land. A bit of history, (leaving out the perfidious Albion 1917 stuff): In 1947 the United Nations, in contravention of its own Charter and under pressure from America, voted to give the land of one people to another group of people. the 30% of Jews, mostly 1st & 2nd generation immigrants, were ‘given’ 55% of the land. Naturally the people who’d been there generations, including many Christians, objected. That the Zionist Jews understood the necessity of ‘ethnic cleansing’ is clear from the records, (‘The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine’ by Ilan Pappe, et al..).
Interestingly, despite the provocations, Palestinians in the main do not hate Jews. Having no notion of their persecutions in Europe they didn’t understand why the Jews wanted their land. Many are remarkably generous in their thinking today.
There’s a quite balanced piece in today’s independent by Adrian Hamilton (not a fave writer) showing how war suits both Hamas & Netanyahu politically. The ICAHD statement provides another view from Israeli Jews in Israel.
Prior to operation ‘Cast Lead’ in 2008/9 I was in Israel & at the Erez crossing. By that November Hamas had been operating a unilateral ceasefire since June 19 which Israel had ignored. Twice in November 2008 Israeli military attacked ‘militants’ in Gaza in the process killing some 14 civilians including children. Hamas responded with rockets which at the time were little more than fireworks.
Taken across the whole West Bank and Gaza since 2001 and excluding ‘Cast Lead’ Palestinians have been killed at a rate of 5 or 6 to every Israeli killed. Any death is a tragedy but to justify one side and criticize the other without regard to the facts is unjust. And I merely ask what was the problem before Hamas (1987/8), why was Hamas created, and how did they manage to grow in such a tightly controlled environment?
We need to start listening and responding to the voices for peace on both sides, Jewish Voice for Peace, ICAHD, Breaking the Silence, Combatants for Peace, ews for Justice for Palestinians, Musalaha, and my own Middle East Evangelical Concern amongst many others.